To Pray or Not to Pray That is the Question upon Society.
Growing up attending private Catholic school my whole life I never had been confronted with the controversy of prayer in school. Not until Santa Fe School District v. Doe did I ever even think there was a conflict concerning prayer in school. I attended Santa Fe football games because I lived only fifteen minutes away and had friends that went to Santa Fe. To see a girl from band go up to the press box and say a prayer was not uncommon to me. We always either had a priest or clergy member begin our games with a prayer, even when we played non-Catholic schools. To hear on the news that the Supreme Court had ruled against prayer at games struck me as strange. Nobody at the game was complaining or screaming for her to stop. I had to actually sit back, analyze, and wonder. Was this the same government who prints, "In God we trust" on every currency and bank note? As the news of the ruling began to reach more and more of the public, a line was drawn. People were either for or against prayer in school. Where you stood on the subject decided your place in the community. Not since segregation had the little town of Santa Fe been so divided. The nation has become divided on this issue. Prayer in school seems to be an argument that one can find just about anywhere. The controversial subject of school prayer has divided society, as a whole, on whether or not there is a place in schools for God.
With our nation in a state of shock from previous classroom shootings, the lack of prayer in school has been pointed to as evidence and cause of this violence and the breakdown of society (Baik 1). Due to September 11th, the support for school prayer rebounded to being seen as necessary. When Reverend Jesse Jackson, after September 11, instructed the students and faculty at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Alexandria, V.A. he instructed "Everyone stand up, hold hands with your neighbor and repeat after me" (Morse 1).
